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Defensemen: Keep it simple

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Last Updated on Sunday, 27 May 2012 23:31

By John Russo

Let’s Play Hockey Columnist

In my opinion, defense is the most challenging skating position (wing, center, defense) to play. It takes more skills, not only because defensemen spend a considerable amount of time going backwards, but also because they have to be somewhat physical and have the passing skills (and smarts) of a center.

Many defensemen, however, make their position much more difficult by making it more “complicated” than it needs to be. The defense position is really pretty simple in its basic concept. As it is made more “complicated,” defense becomes more difficult (less simple) and riskier.

Most D’s are not even closely capable of playing their position in a complicated manner. There are only a handful of these exceptional D’s in the NHL.

It’s not a bad idea for players to admire exceptional D’s and to try to gain some of the skills and do some of the moves that they have. However, the first thing a young D needs to do is understand the very basic things that make up a good, solid D. Probably as many as 60-65 percent of the D’s in the NHL are in the “just good, solid” category. It is enough challenge to be a good, solid D!

So, what are these items and skills that make up a good, solid D and keeps the position simple? First, it absolutely does not include solos up the ice and overhandling the puck in the defensive zones. For one thing, penetrating into the offensive zone (as a D) requires outstanding speed and skating skills — not just good, but outstanding. Handling the puck (overhandling) in the defensive and neutral zones requires this outstanding skating plus outstanding hand skills as well. It is a very rare D that has these traits plus the strength, hockey sense, etc. that make up the rare exceptional D.

To be a very good D — to “make a living” at it — you have to be able to do several things:

• Cover in you own end. This does not mean that you do anybody else’s job; just your own or area coverage.

• Move the puck out of the defensive zone. Preferably in possession of your team, but in any regard out of the zone.  This means by passing (preferable), carrying or dumping.

• Support the rush into the offensive zone. This is not a critical item but simply following the play up the ice “smartly” can satisfy it.

• Support the offense on the offensive zone. Being in the right position to pass, shoot, etc., as part of the offense.

• Defend in the neutral zone. This really just means trying to defend an opposition rush as it comes through the neutral zone without taking too much risk.

• Defending the rush in the defensive zone. This is “killing” the initial rush until support coverage arrives.

Notice that scoring is not one of the items. Of course scoring is nice, but it is not generally what is expected of a good, solid D. I always say that good, solid D’s get their points with good passes or from the offensive blue line.

To really simplify, a good, solid D’s job — it is to: defend (cover) in the zone; move the puck out of the zone; and support in the other two zones, especially in defending the defensive blue line. Everything else is a bonus! A nicely skilled physical D that can do what I said in the sentence above can make a nice living with any NHL team!

Most young players complicate these very simple items and create risk all over the ice. D’s need to be risk reducers and risk avoiders. The easiest way to go through the D basics is to “follow the puck” as it moves out of the defensive zone, up the ice to the offensive zone — than back into the defensive zone.

Moving Up the Ice

• Once the D collects the puck in the defensive zone, the first option is to move the puck to an open forward for a breakout. If that is not an option and there is low risk open ice, the second option is to skate the puck toward the blue line. Another option is a cross-pass to a D partner. Going backwards with the puck or passing (very far) backwards are not good options (I don’t like to go backwards in the defensive zone). The partner D then has the same options (pass, skate). If no passes or open ice are available, then the third option is to dump the puck (high flip or off the glass) into the neutral zone or beyond.

• Once over the blue line with the puck (assumes D had to carry it), the options have to be considered again. First option (always) is pass to a forward; then again look for low risk open ice to skate it; then if trapped, dump it forward into the offensive zone. Cross passing to a partner is high risk in this area unless the area between is very open.

• If still carrying it through the neutral zone, then it is a race for the red line while still looking for a pass to a forward.

• Once the red line is captured, another option opens up. Again the options are pass, skate or dump; except the dump option becomes better than the skate option at this point because the puck can be dumped deep with forwards already in motion near the offensive blue line. Continued skating often hangs up the forwards near the blue line and the attacking (D) goes over the blue line with no support — a true solo!

• The puck now has been passed or dumped for an attack into the offensive zone. The D’s job now becomes one of offensive support and defensive monitoring. One D can follow the attack to the top of the circle and become an option, but shouldn’t go any deeper.

• If the D still has the puck going over the blue line then becoming part of the attack depends upon conditions. If an advantage (1-0, 2-1, 3-2, 4-3) exists, the D should continue with the attack. Immediately when the attack becomes neutral or disadvantageous, the D needs to stop and become a “pure” D between the blue line and top of circle. Any further progression with the attack is not likely to produce a scoring chance but does increase the risk substantially.

Coming Back on Defense

• Of course in the offensive zone, the D’s could have passing or shooting opportunities (another subject) while they support the offensive attack. However, a conservative posture is normally in order unless the conditions dictate otherwise.

• Once the opposition collects the puck, the whole process goes in the other direction. The first decision is whether or not to defend the offensive blue line. Except for special conditions or systems, D’s would only defend the blue line if they had forward support and would not be risking a disadvantaged attack. The normal condition would be to move into the neutral zone not leaving too much of a gap to the attack.

• Once the attack moves into the neutral zone, the D’s must assess the situation and decide how they are going to defend their own blue line. One of the options is not to take chances by “stabbing out” at the attacking forwards. If it appears that the defensive forwards are “in position” backchecking, shortening the gap and defending the blue line is in order. This is also “in order” if the defensive forwards are “not far away” — to allow them to catch up.  If no support is evident, then giving up the blue line is in order. Again, slowing down the attack and directing it to the outside will allow the backcheckers to catch up. The idea is to get the attack out of the scoring areas so normal defensive zone coverage can kick in.

• There are many possibilities for in-zone coverage responsibilities for D’s. For zone coverages, one D will most likely need to be in front of the net. For man-on-man coverages that may not be true. However, the two D’s and center are the primary around-the-net defenders in the scoring areas and must be able to physically defend. They also need to know how to maintain positions of defensive advantage. This most often involves keeping the opposition forward on the outside.

Well — we are back to collecting the puck and breaking out again. Very little offensive goal scoring or lugging the puck long distances was involved in the descriptions.

On the other hand, many decisions were involved mostly involving moving the puck (not necessarily carrying it) offensively or defending lines or areas defensively. Bad decisions in both directions create risk. Coaches should review this article with their D’s, using a “rink form” to show specific areas with a pen. It might also be in order to demonstrate on the ice. Associations should have “defense camps” before the season begins to make certain all of their D’s know what is expected of them.

Finally, coaches need to constantly enforce these concepts at all levels.  Players need to have feedback as to how they are doing.

Moving up the hockey ladder

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Last Updated on Sunday, 27 May 2012 23:31

By Hal Tearse

Minnesota Hockey Coach-in-Chief

Brian made the PeeWee B1 team as a first year PeeWee after having an outstanding two years in Squirts. He was thrilled to make the second best PeeWee team in the association until the third week of the season when reality set in. In Squirts, Brian was faster than most of the other players and he scored goals in nearly every game. In PeeWees initially he was a step slow and having trouble scoring. As the team won their fourth game of the season Brian was in tears because he had not scored any of the goals and he was afraid that his father would be so upset with him that the “long ride home” would be tough to take, again.

This true story illustrates a couple of points that parents and coaches all need to remember with first year players at any level. Nearly all players need time to adjust as they move to the next level of play and parents can place undue and undeserved pressure on their kids to perform.

Moving to a higher level, be it PeeWees to Bantams, Bantams to high school or high school to juniors/college,  requires players to adapt to the increased speed of the game and the increased physical aspects at the new level. Every level of the game is faster and quicker than the level below. As players move through the levels the talent level narrows on teams to a point where all of the players are fast and skilled. It takes time to adjust to the quicker pace and they need to make decisions faster and act sooner. It takes time to adjust.

In the youth ranks and for players moving to high school hockey, first-year players could take a couple months before they fully adjust to the new level. Boston Bruin rookie, Blake Wheeler, took about 12 weeks to adjust when he moved from PeeWees to Bantams, and similarly he needed time to adjust to each new level thereafter. The bigger the level of change, the more time needed to adjust. Players leaving Bantams to move into high school typically would move to junior varsity as they acclimate to the high school game. With fewer players available to many high school coaches in smaller programs, 10th grade players are often moved right to varsity level and expected to perform immediately which is an unfair expectation. Coaches and parents need to allow time for the younger players to develop and adjust to the faster game at the higher level.

Brian’s story has a happy ending. I visited with his father, who had not played hockey, and explained the current situation. His father was shocked. He had not understood that his son needed time to adjust to the faster pace and bigger kids. Furthermore he was stunned by the pressure he had unfairly put onto son’s shoulders. To learn that Brian was scared of getting into the car with him after the game brought tears to his eyes. Brian’s dad promised to let the coaches coach and to support Brian in a positive way from that day forward. He kept his word and Brian had a great season once he adjusted to the new level of play.

As players move to the next level, parents and coaches need to have patience and allow the time required to adapt to the new level. Putting pressure on kids too soon is a coaching and parenting failure not a failure by the players. When I coached Bantams I would tell the first-year boys that I would let them know when they were “officially Bantams” and in the meantime play hard and have fun as they adjust. For most boys it took until mid-season before they had made the adjustments. The same is true at all other levels.

As you watch your son or daughter move to a new level, remember the story of Brian and his Dad. Be supportive and positive while your child learns new skills, adjusts to the faster pace and enjoys playing the great game of hockey. 

Elevating the comfort zone – It’s more than just speed

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Last Updated on Sunday, 27 May 2012 23:31

By Jack Blatherwick

Let’s Play Hockey Columnist

Development in hockey is not just a matter of improving skills, athleticism and competitive instincts. It also requires elevating the comfort zone for each of these. In other words, you must be able to perform the skills at high speed, and in awkward, competitive situations.

A far-fetched analogy will take some imagination, but I promise we’ll return to hockey. Say I practiced jump shots for a decade, and got to be as good at shooting as Kobe Bryant (OK, stick with me on this imagination thing). And pretend I was the same height, had the same skills, the same athleticism (speed, quickness, agility and jumping ability) and the same arrogant confidence (now we’re really stretching the imagination).

If I had never played basketball, would I be able to shoot on the fly with a hand in my face, while being guarded closely in an NBA game? Of course not. Bryant has been in that situation thousands of times and adapted his skills to the competition. This is his comfort zone – not mine. It’s not even the comfort zone for the most skillful college basketball player taking his first steps onto the NBA court.

Back to hockey. It’s one thing to improve stickhandling; it’s another to do it while skating full speed, when the best defenseman in your conference is competing with you. And then…to perform the same skill at a higher level of hockey requires another elevation of your comfort zone.

There are two schools of thought about the best way to develop skills that will work in the most competitive environments: The traditional progression – the ‘part-to-whole’ method – goes like this: (a) practice each skill while stationary or at slow speed with no competition; then (b) integrate skills and practice them at higher speed and/or against increasing levels of competition.

There’s nothing profound about this, of course. It’s the way most teachers and coaches operate. But here’s where Russian youth coaches can teach us about comfort zones. They are constantly making the task more realistic – more game-like.

Consider Russian dryland training. Their first step is to develop athleticism using highly explosive, agile, quick activities. In other words, to develop an athlete who can do things on the ice like Randy Moss does them on the football field, their training must be highly athletic. You won’t find young Russian athletes sitting on a bench, lifting heavy weights.

They integrate many athletic skills at once, where our learning environments are more compartmentalized, meaning we go to the weight room for strength workouts that are separated from skill workouts; and those are separate from speed or endurance workouts. But hockey requires all these at once. Integration of athletic skills is the first distinction I’ve observed regarding Russian development.

Then, to elevate the comfort zone, young hockey players often do their sprints or jumps while stickhandling an imaginary puck. Next, the multitasking is elevated to another level, and players must look around and react to visual stimuli.

After several seasons as an NHL forward and college coach, Dean Talafous started a similar training program, called Total Hockey. His experience taught him that combining skills with vision and athleticism was the logical way to develop hockey talent, since this was required in competition.

You don’t find this in textbooks for strength/conditioning coaches in American colleges — sprinting, jumping, hopping, while stickhandling a ball. This is weird stuff in our country, but very common in Europe and Russia.

On the ice, they might not progress as we would either. Some Russian coaches don’t believe in the ‘part-to-whole’ method of learning – the traditional (a) to (b) progression outlined above. Perhaps more than any other sport, hockey requires rapid decision-making and multi-tasking skills, so many neuro-scientists believe these abilities must be cultivated right from the start. It’s interesting that in several conversations, Bobby Orr has expressed the same opinion, that isolating skills is not as effective.

For example, in the early stages of learning to shoot, young players must incorporate a fake, a quick cut, and a shot – performed while skating, of course. This is called ‘whole-to-part’ learning. Alex Ovechkin’s shot isn’t better than others when he’s standing still, but let him skate full speed down the wing, fake to the outside, cut to the middle and release the shot quickly between the skates of the defender – well, watch closely, because it’s a blur. This sequence of movements was practiced thousands of times at a young age.

The jury is still out about the best way to learn, and it will be for many years. However, one thing’s for sure: to develop players who can take their skills to higher levels, coaches must constantly elevate the comfort zones for those skills.

Increasing the speed of execution, the difficulty and number of decisions, the complexity of multi-tasking, the level of instantaneous creativity, and the stress of competition – these are all examples of elevating the comfort zone for skill development. By definition, players will not be comfortable with this type of training.

But to do our jobs as coaches, we must give them the best opportunity to fulfill their ambitions. Elevating comfort zones is not only about preparing young athletes to move to another level in another year, but it might also be the best way to prepare a team to ‘over-achieve’ at playoff time.

Jack Blatherwick, Ph.D., is a physiologist for the Washington Capitals.

Use the holiday season to transform your hockey season

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Last Updated on Sunday, 27 May 2012 23:31

By Kim McCullough, M.Sc, YCS

What young hockey players do over the holiday season has a huge impact on how they play in the second half of the year. If they use their time and energy wisely, they will have a great playoff run. If they don’t, the last three months of the season could be a struggle. Here are the top three things all young hockey players should do this holiday season to take their performance to the next level.

Take a day off 

Take a day off from playing. You don’t need to be over at the outdoor rink playing shinny for three hours every day in order to keep up your skills over the holidays. I thought the same thing when I was growing up too – I thought that I had to skate as much as possible in order to stay at the top of my game. Without school to get in my way, I could play more all winter break and I did. But by the time February and March rolled around, I was just plain tired. I still had the passion for being out on the ice, but I didn’t have the same “spark” and “jump” that I was used to. 

Take a few days off. Your body will thank you and after a couple of days away from the ice, you’ll be more excited about getting out there than ever. And by letting your body recover for a few days, you will play better for the rest of the season.

Stretch more   

I know that you don’t have any time to stretch during the regular season. It can be hard to fit in between all your games, practices and school work. We both know that you can find 10 minutes each day to stretch your tight hockey muscles, but I also know that it is one of the last things players want to do.

With a little bit of a break in your busy schedule, you have no more excuses when it comes to stretching. Stretch while you are watching TV, between tournament games and before you go to bed. Any flexibility that you can gain in your hip flexors, glutes, quadriceps and groin over the holidays will help you to play better and stay injury-free once the playoff push starts in January.

“Play” without playing 

Go play pick-up hockey. Get your friends together, find a rink and just play. Teams become so focused on having more structured ice time, with more games and more practices, that young players rarely have the chance to just go out and play anymore. Now is your chance. Go find a pick-up game and try out moves you would never try during a league game. Play a completely different position and don’t worry about being in the wrong place at the wrong time on the forecheck.

Some of my best hockey memories come from playing pick-up hockey at the run-down rink across the street from my house. I couldn’t tell you what the score was, who my teammates were or how many points I had – but I can tell you that it was FUN. Do your best to focus on this three-letter word this holiday season instead of the one most people focus on (W-I-N). 

It doesn’t matter if you are playing in tournaments throughout the holidays or have a break from your team schedule. Take the time to address these three keys and you’ll have a great start to 2009 and finish the season on a high note.

About the author

To learn more about how to help your players their game to the next level this holiday season, get your Free Report:  The 6 Secrets of In-Season Success at http://besthockeyseasonever.com/. Coach Kim McCullough’s player development websites gives the coaches and parents of aspiring young players access to programs, articles and advice on how to help their players take their game to the next level safely and effectively. In addition to training and coaching players at all levels of hockey, from peewee to the pros, Kim has also played at the highest level of women’s hockey in the world for the last decade.